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hurting

I haven’t had much time to spend alone. Which in a way can be okay, but in honor of this experiment I should be alone. Alone with my thoughts, alone with my worries, alone with my struggles. At the current time I can’t do things alone but I find myself learning to do everything alone. A few nights ago I couldn’t wait to come home. Sleep in my own bed, go back to my life. Back to my routine and what not. I had this fear of leaving my home that paralyzed my thoughts. I cried for no reason and felt this petrified feeling that everyone I loved was further and further away from me.

When you’re depressed, this dark cloud looms over you. It doesn’t matter how many times you change your attitude or how much you try to feel better, nothing works. Before I left, something snapped. I couldn’t point a finger at the exact moment, but something happened and my heart broke. I carry things with me from the past that trail ahead into my present. I could point the finger at many culprits of my problems, but the longer the finger points the more I realize the 3 fingers that point back at me. Maybe I was always the weight of my own problems. Maybe I was the one that caused all this unhappiness. Maybe in the end I deserved all this sadness and unhappiness. I hadn’t felt like a good person in a long time. I knew I was selfish, I knew I was a hurtful person, I just didn’t know how much longer I could keep going. When someone tells you what a bad person you are, you start believing it. It infects your bloodstream and seeps deep into your bones, this negativity and paranoia that no matter how much you change, you’ll always feel the same.

It’s all in my head. All in my head to believe those things. Some part of myself believes that all the goodness that I once had inside of me, left a long time ago. Instead I am left with a walking corpse that cynical ways infects negativity to everyone. I believe I am bad luck. Anything bad that happens to anyone, I believe I am the cause of it. Deep inside I do believe that people are better off without me. Its one of the reasons why I retreat to my shell so often. It’s why I hide from the world, its why I have wanted to spend this time alone. Because a world without me, is a better place for everyone. I know people will read this and think I have absolutely gone mental (or maybe believe that I am right). I painted this picture of my life and built it around so many good people, but once I feel I have hurt enough people, I paint myself out of the portrait. My mouth and my bullshit juvenile ways have found a way to alienate people. When I try to reverse the damage, people mistake my kindness for weakness and walk all over me. I can’t win either way. I can’t keep running away from my problems. I can’t keep pretending that my worries don’t keep me awake at night. I can’t keep allowing the errors of my past mistakes continue to haunt me. I know I can be good, I know I can be a good person.

I thought about coming home. People I miss, people who don’t really have a clue about whats is going on, which made me yearn to go home. Figure everything all out. Then I wished to pack my bags and run far away back into my hometown. Deep into the dead center. Then I came to the realization that being home would only flood back memories. I am not okay. I am not better but being lost in a city filled with so many people feels better than feeling hopelessly lost. I don’t know where I am going. I don’t know what I am doing and as the days inch closer to being home, I realized how much I don’t want to be home. It rains so heavily here. It rains so often that all I want to do is reach my hand out of windows and feel the rain against my skin. Feel comfort from the feeling of running away. I could lay in bed until the clouds come back to haunt my skin and push away the sun. The lighting illuminates the sky white from the black. Crying out streams of light that guides us to a better way of feeling. It screams mimic my heart beat and I just want to be alone. I don’t have the straight to come back home. I don’t have the energy to pretend that my skin doesn’t hurt. I could lie in this bed forever. Staring at the clouds that come in. Staring at the familiar walls and tiles. All the comforting scents of this city.

Life has been nonstop since the beginning of this trip. So much that at times I feel suffocated with the day to day activities. Some days my body can’t take it and other days I can’t help but force myself to solider on. I put my mask on better than everyone, but being so far from home doesn’t make sense, to force myself to be who I am at home. I rinse off the day and go on my way. Barefaced, hair a mess and pray no one notices me.

When you get older you stop caring about how you look to people. You reach a point where the only person you really care to impress, is yourself. After turning 30, you lose a sense of insecurity about appearance. What I used to care about in my 20’s, has completely disappeared in my 30’s. I have always been insecure about my weight and appearance but when you’re far from home, you really stop giving a shit. I don’t care what people think of me. I reached a point where the mirror holds two faces, Who I see and who I feel. Sometimes I don’t even know who I am anymore. When you face yourself without masks, without makeup, without any trace of your superficial self, you get a sense of who you really are. I am not my eyeliner or mascara or any of the thousands of creams I use on my face. At the same time, I am not the barefaced individual I see before me. You lose a sense of identity after years of hiding beneath masks, but at the same time you’re faced with the reality of how you really feel about yourself. As I inch closer into my 30’s I realize that every year I lose a layer of insecurity that I thought I needed before. I realize that going out of the house without makeup isn’t the end of the world, even if at times I felt as it was.

Lately I just want the rains to weigh me down and absorb into my skin. I want the water to match the streams that fall from my face. I want a lot of things. Mainly to slow down enough to truly enjoy the rain and not run from it. Running for cover to shield myself from the downpours. I want to breathe again and honestly feel the air rise and fall in my chest and into my lungs. I watch as the shell of my former self breaks down at what she used to love. I feel my heart turn to glass and know that at any given moment it will break. When you are occupied with your surroundings you push everything you feel deeper inside of you. I wish I could put into words how it feels. The faster moments come, the sooner the come down. Slow down, relax, feel the weight of the rain on your skin. I just want to stand in silence in complete aw of this large city. Sit and watch the views. Watch as the sky clears.

I have a problem with thinking. Thinking about the past, present and where I fit in the after. Things weigh heavily on my mind. Things I’ve never told anyone, things that I should have had my peace with and let go. Demons are funny faceless creatures that reach out to you at every time. I can’t help but think about these nameless, faceless creatures. Demons haunt my thoughts and drown me with voices that never stop.

These are the cards that I have dealt with. This is my present and my future. I have always been this bad luck hero that morphs into a villainous evil. This bad luck falls then follows and carries me home. I am not okay, but I tell everyone I am fine. I am fine and focus conversations on things that have nothing to do with me. I lie here lying about every little thing I don’t want to lie about anymore. I am not okay but I say I am just fine just to get by.

Finding this bitterness take away the good I have left in me. Take away this light that glittered is now dimmed in this darkness. I am the bad guy that lives long enough to be the villain in this story. Lying here, lying to a million faces. It’s these demons you can’t see, that close in on me. But even I can’t blame them.

I am crystal clear that radiates blue. Even a glowworm glows and you find them. Among the crowds through the lighthouses. I am standing in front of you but you don’t see me. I radiate blue but you can’t find me. I am fading away, leaving, and one day I will disappear.

Disappear to the highest hills. Disappear through the trees and into the woods, where you’ll never find me. Finding is for things that are already lost, but I am not lost. I am invisible in this world that always sees things. Invisible to the crowds that look for things far beyond their reach. You’ll forget about me as easily as you remember me. Watching my surroundings blur out of focus with the familiar faces walking right past me. No one sees me, but I see you. I see everyone. I see their cracks and fears and every single one of their flaws. Their perfect imperfections that no one seems to see. I feel a disconnect from this world. Single glances taking second chances but I can’t help but feel alone. Standing amongst the crowds of people and asking them to see me.

You can’t see me but you see right through me. The ghost that haunts and appears when needed. But you don’t see me. I am invisible in their visible world. Slowly I watch myself disappear, just begging you to look at me. Everyone thinks they understand but they don’t. Everyone thinks they know, but they never ask. I could stand on the highest hill but you’ll focus on the scenery.

I am here. I am here, but you see right through me. I am here but you look right past me.

I didn’t tell anyone I was traveling. I didn’t make some epic post on social media. I didn’t even give a hint that I was going. I wasn’t up to all of it to be completely honest. If I had to be really honest, I really just wanted to disappear. I didn’t want to die, even if at times I felt that way. I just didn’t feel the need to tell anyone anything. It probably sounds stupid and juvenile but I’ve always been so public about different aspects of myself. Just this once, I didn’t want to say anything.

I haven’t been sleeping well for the past couple of weeks. This wave of paranoia hit me like something out of a nightmare. I’ve travelled thousands of times. Thousands of times alone or with friends. This time felt different, that I was hiding from something I couldn’t contain anymore. I thought I was going to lose it in the check-in line. I thought I was going to lose it in security. I thought I was going to cancel this trip right in the airport. If I had it in me, I would change my ticket and fly to a million different places. Places where no one would find me. I am clouded with this idea that we have to tell people where we are and what we are doing, but I just want to get lost and leave. Disappear completely. Disappear in the sights and sounds of places where only few people would find me. As of this point, I can’t do it anymore. I can’t pretend that this is just something that happens to people. At this point in my life, I don’t know if I can survive these feelings. Its haunting my life to the point that I can’t sleep anymore. I am hurting in places, I don’t want to hurt anymore. I am holding on by a very thin thread and at any given moment I will break.

Airports are always interesting places. I have spent a good amount of time at airports. Coming and going, take off and landings. I always felt it was the most loneliest place you could be. You’re never sure if someone’s journey is just beginning or ending. I become fascinated by strangers, their stories and their lives. I could sit and people watch for hours. I could sit down in the countless chairs by the gates and watch people. People on their phones, gossiping with people, people reading books, everything. You almost want to open your heart to these people and invite them in. See who they are and share a piece of yourself. In many ways thats what drives my madness. This need to share a piece of myself and open my heart to people. I’ve been fearful of people hurting me again, that I didn’t realize I was only hurting myself. I go on all these trips to find myself to scare myself. To prove to myself how much I can do on my own. When it’s the comfort of people I really seek. A smile from a stranger, a “good morning” from a neighbor, a “thank you” from a person sitting next to you.

We are all connected by strings and when we least expect it to we cut our strings to be free from everyone. We don’t realize how desperately we need these strings. How we’d stop the world to restring ourselves to all these people. I want to learn to live without these strings and realize I need these strings as much as I need to be free. I want to disappear and I want strings to pull me back to myself. I don’t know. I found myself in my seat on the plane and as we were descending into my final destination, I realized how much I missed the adventure of life. Everything I’ve done in my life had been completely out of the norm of everyone else’s life. I had been feeling guilty of steering off the path, that I was bringing myself down. I missed adventure, I missed different places, I missed what I loved about life. A lot has changed since my last trip, and I knew that. I watched as the plane slowly circled the city and realized I missed the comfort of home and the comfort of people. I needed to be alone with my darkness to realize how much I don’t need a lot of things. Looking down at the city with it’s buildings and cars and people, I felt so insignificant. Harboring all this pain has made me feel like a stranger to many people, but I felt like a stranger to myself. Before I could enjoy the view, I couldn’t help but start to cry.

If I write this all down maybe it will stop hurting. Taking everything I have inside and spilling my guts for the world to see will make me feel better. Nothing could make me feel worse then how I feel at this very moment. Anything to take away this pain.

The truth is I don’t feel like myself lately. Someone has taken a hold of my body, my arms, my legs, my brain and my thoughts. If I write everything down, it won’t hurt as much. It won’t hurt to say how bad I’m feeling or how hard life feels at times. I want to disappear, leave this life and everything I see before me. I want all these thoughts to drown in the deepest oceans, and only then would I finally feel free. I could finally feel like who I am suppose to be, opposed to this phony way of feeling.

I want to hurt myself in every possible way, claw off my skin to reach my insides. Purge every negative though I could possible think of. I don’t want to talk anymore. I don’t want to respond with “I am fine”, when I am fucking losing my mind. It hurts. It all hurts inside. This rotten feeling that will only go away once I am gone. I have done all these wrong things, that never out weigh the good. Its my selfish ways that lead to selfish thoughts. I am not good enough. I am not strong enough. We are all going mad but afraid to show the world. I wish I didn’t feel so empty. I wish I didn’t have to drive myself to escape this bullshit reality. Maybe one day this will all disappear.

People are drifting further away from me. Keeping themselves at arms length and slowly walking away. Its for the best because I would do the same too. I am tired of hurting people, only telling them what they want to hear. I am tired of pretending that everything is going to be okay, when I am completely falling apart. This isn’t who I am, this isn’t who I am suppose to be. I am watching my life in slow motion, when everyone is running to the speed of light. Life was never suppose to be perfect, but it wasn’t suppose to hurt this much either. I guess I just want a moment to myself to pretend I’ll be just fine.

I had every intention of being productive. I find myself saying that a lot. Every intention of starting and finishing something in the day. Every intention of getting up early, going to the gym, getting coffee, starting a million little ideas and finding ways of finishing them. That was my intention but like all great ideas, some of them just stay ideas without the follow through. You have these ideas of expectations of how your life is suppose to react, then life gets mixed up with reality. I wasn’t feeling really well and by the time I started feeling better it was already 11 am. Which of course I could have just started my day later but the momentum of starting just became the biggest killjoy.

Somewhere between when the morning and afternoon came together, I decided that since everything got off at an awkward start that I would clean my closet. I’ll be honest (this honestly thing becomes a recurring theme in my life), I have let a lot of things fall through the cracks. My room has sat in the same position for the past 2 years and my closet is just as pathetically disgusting. I don’t understand it. I am a fairly neat person, I hate when my room is filled with clutter and chaos. By the time I come home, I just don’t want to be bothered by anything. I see books clutter open spaces, I see clothes overlap chairs, I see stacks of papers and unopened envelopes collect dust on every desk and table as far as I can see. My closet is no exception. I get an idea in my head of how my closet should be, and a few months of this feng shui works fine and then the rest of the year its utter chaos. I am a packrat when it comes to clothes. While everyone else hoards memories with material objects, I have a hard time letting clothes go. Sure I’ve sold a few new items on social platforms, I’ve given clothes away to family members or friends, but even through that cleansing I still have a lot to go through. In a way I could get rid of every last item in my room but my clothes are the hardest to let go. In a way my closet is like my Toy Story and every article of clothing has a living breathing purpose and pulse. Every piece tells a story better than any photograph could.

Even with all these stories and adventures, I just can’t seem to find a purpose in this closet. It feels like everything is falling apart in this closet, even though no one else can see it but me. I purchased a garment rack over a year ago and due to the weight of clothes, it was slowly falling apart (literally falling apart). Clothes were spilling out from every side of my closet and slowly were spilling out into my room. They say your home is a representation of yourself and at this point, my room was telling me my life is a mess. I don’t have an organized process to clean my closet. I usually just start throwing things onto my bed and then go from there. I started moving everything from the back of the closet to into the front and realized how many things where hidden in the chaos. You start going through your nostalgic reasons for having things and then you realize how silly that makes you seem. On top of an almost tragically broken garment rack, I found an old collage of a band that I used to love hidden behind all the clothes and shoes. This collage that once served a purpose in my life was now just a distant memory hidden in my closet for no one to see. I guess in a way I felt bad that I wasn’t taking care of my stuff, let alone my own life. I watched how things I had long since forgotten, just happened to be found within the chaos of my closet.

I guess you can say it started with the garment rack and ended with the dresses. It was like something hit me hard in my chest and worked its way to every single one of my feelings. I became frustrated fixing the garment rack that once it was fixed, I just wanted to rip everything off the hangers. Of course I can’t go into anything in my life lightly. I have to go into dramatics, throw my hands up in the air, scream a variety of colorful words, and have a complete meltdown. This didn’t feel like a normal meltdown. This felt like a million different fingers pointed back at me, for a variety of different reasons. I can’t let go of the past and being in this closet assured me of that. I felt the weight of a hundred dresses and their stories pointed back at me for everything I had done or was doing. Somewhere between the garment rack and the dresses, I hid myself in my bathroom and cried. I can’t keep it together anymore, I can’t even pretend to know what I am doing with my life anymore. The longer I hide things deep in my closet, the sooner its going to spill out into my life and mess up my present. I wish I could say I knew this was going to happen, that I could pinpoint the exact moment that everything started feeling like it was falling apart but I can’t. I can’t because honestly I don’t know. I keep so much of life inside that when I can’t anymore, anything and everything becomes a trigger. Even a tiny garment rack and a closet full of dresses.

I didn’t stop crying once I left the bathroom. I didn’t stop crying when I fixed the garment rack and I didn’t stop crying once I sat on an empty space in the closet hugging all my dresses. Maybe, I am truly crazy. Maybe, I shouldn’t be here. Maybe, everything I am doing in this life is wrong. I wanted to disappear and run away. Run away from everything that was sitting in front of me. This hurricane of clothes that overtook every inch of my closet. This hurricane of memories and nostalgia that can’t help but continue to keep me down. I wanted to go hide in the dark and return to my self destructive nature. Cut up every single one of my old scars and burn every last one of the feelings I had inside of me. I wanted too. Anything that would take away these feelings. But I didn’t do any of those things. Not any of those things. Instead I sat with my legs crossed and picked up every dress from the floor and removed the hanger. All hangers in one place. All dresses in another. The past has a funny way of hurting even after everything has been said and done. On the days you’re hurting the pain of ghosts seep right through you. I have never been immune to that. I placed the pile of dresses on my lap and couldn’t help but rest my head on them. Then I continued to cry.

“You never finish what you start”

I sat there paralyzed in my own bullshit, because thats what this was, it’s complete and utter bullshit. I thought of 1000 ways to die. How life would be better without me but that was all bullshit. I will be honest with what I have to say, I was missing people. It doesn’t matter how much a person can hurt you, what hurts the most isn’t what they did to you, its the vacant feeling you have in your heart once they leave. Thats what I have been feeling. I was missing people I should have forgave and forgotten a long time ago. I was missing things that no longer exist. I was missing a person I no longer was, in favor of what I was doing. That is not healing. That is not moving on. It’s amazing what your mind does when you’re upset. Flashbacks, conversations, and photographs. I am really good at keeping everything hidden inside of my heart until one day everything starts spilling out. In that moment, I thought about the dresses. Each dress distinctly different in style and color. I thought about the last time I wore each dress and if they served their purpose. I thought about memories I thought I had forgetten and memories I can’t seem to forget. Then before I knew it, I stopped crying.

I know I am not where I am suppose to be. I know that I have done a lot of things differently than I had expected. I know that I have let a lot of people hurt me and I in turn have hurt a lot of people. Its not my quest to be perfect, and as human as I try to be I will continue to make mistakes. It took me to clean out my closet to realize that at this current moment I am not good to anyone right now. I can’t keep my life together, what makes me expect the same from others. As much as I miss people, I can’t help them and they can’t help me. People have lives to lead and follow. I have to do the same for myself. I’ll always have the closet full of clothes and the hundreds of dresses waiting to be worn. But my memories don’t live there anymore.

Before I could shed another tear, I picked myself up and started putting the dresses back on the hangers. Followed by color, then by style. Dress by dress back on the garment rack. Memory by memory back to the racks that hold on to life on every plastic hanger. Everything back to it’s right place.

Growing fears in places where positivity is suppose to shine through. Finding fears in every day people, places, and things. Finding joy in silence and comfort in being alone, but I can’t hide forever. At the risk of saying how I truly feel, I let my fears do all the talking. Everything and everyone I once loved is slowly drifting further away from me. Further seems forever and every day is another day I watch everything slowly drift away.

Maybe I should disappear. Hide in the hills and watch the sun illuminate my surroundings, because all I do is allow the fog to roll in and ruin everything. But this isn’t negativity talking, I am a negative person with positive intentions. Maybe some day I’ll want the sun to shine down on me, just not at this time. Not at this current moment. I was no good to you then and I am no good to you now. My careless sadness has broken away from me. Everything I am suppose to love is slowly drifting further and further away from me. I don’t know what I am doing anymore. I don’t know who I am anymore. The longer I stand in one place, the easier it takes to watch the fear take over me. Where do I go from here? Where do I go to get away from here?

These fears take ahold of my limbs and absorb into my veins. This sad sick feeling of shedding this skin and finding what harbors underneath. I can’t keep doing this to myself. I can’t keep pretending that I don’t like this feeling under my skin, because its the fear that keeps me alive. I fear that after all is said and done, I will have nothing in the end. I don’t need anything where I am going. I don’t need you under my skin. I just need these fears to keep me safe from the worries at night. It’s the places that I have come to fear the most, that keep me awake at night.

It takes a day where the weather changes and freezes your insides. A day like this that has you remember the past. One small change of the weather and your soul is exposed for the world to see. At any moment any word can cause an effect of water works. Larger than any ocean. One huge tidal wave of emotions that no matter how much you hold out your hands, everything comes crashing through.

Its okay to reflect. It’s okay to remember. Remembering that at one point in your life you loved so deeply, it hurt every muscle in your body. It doesn’t matter how often you go through changes like a chameleon, changing stripes to spots. It doesn’t take away the feeling of emptiness. This vacant haunting feeling that no matter what you do, you can’t escape from. Memories come back to haunt you while you sleep, no matter how much you suppress them in your waking life. You loved and you lost, is what you tell yourself. Just one big armor you wear to keep from falling apart. Keep from getting hurt. You watch the water rise and wash against you, still you stand very still. Being still is better than falling apart.

You could write a book on how to ruin someone’s perfect day

The countless times you’ve been knocked down, pushed around, and you walk away with every tear that continues to shed. Its the salt water that comforts but never heals. Every time you walk away, it’s a song, a saying, a sentence, or even tiny change in the weather, that stops you in your tracks and you can’t help but remember. It hits you to straight to your core, worse than any words could. You loved, you lost and you couldn’t help yourself but to move on. Because loving someone this much should never hurt as much as it does. Loving someone to the point of breaking doesn’t make us bulletproof from ourselves.

Why, do you have to make me feel smallSo you can feel whole insideWhy, do you have to put down my dreamsSo you’re the only thing on my mind

I walk around with this armor around my heart, unable to feel the cold in my bones. This armor that hides my emotions from the next person. I am bulletproof. Everything you shot at me bounces off back to you. But on the days where the weather changes the leaves from green to yellow to brown, its when I can’t fight back. Its when a little bit of the cold, hits at my insides and I am exposed to the world. Live and learn, love and loss. Eventually the weather changes and I go on my way. Every once in a while, I slip. I hear a song, a melody, words, and I am right back where I started from. Think what you will about me but sometimes being strong doesn’t give me strength.

Disappear into the mist of a haunting song. Be lost in the melody and forgotten between the bars. I am not there, I am not anywhere. I want to race toward the dark and hide within the sounds of sorrowing goodbyes.

I do this to myself. I do this on my own. I am not there. If you saw me, you wouldn’t see right through me. If you saw me, I wouldn’t need to disappear.

I watch the memories tarnish and turn shades of bronze. I watch people come and go as they please and burn themselves brightly in the sun. But I am not there. I watch myself drop beneath the shallow graves into the ground. I watch as one by one of my scars open up slowly. I am bleeding turning black and blue, but you don’t see me. I’ll be gone before you know it. I’ll be gone before the words reach you.

I am crystal clear in the sunlight days, but now I bleed black and blue. If only I could outstretch my arms to the skies and reach straight to the stars. If only I could pretend that a little light is better than no light at all. Slowly I sink beneath the hollow ground beneath the earth and silently turn to dust.